To the People of the Confederate States of America.

The General in Chief of our Army has found it necessary to make
such movements of the troops as to uncover the capital and thus involve
the withdrawal of the Government from the city of Richmond.

It would be unwise, even were it possible, to conceal the great
moral as well as material injury to our cause that must result from the
occupation of Richmond by the enemy. It is equally unwise and unworthy
of us, as patriots engaged in a most sacred cause, to allow our energies
to falter, our spirits to grow faint, or our efforts to become relaxed
under reverses, however calamitous. While it has been to us a source of
national pride that for four years of unequaled warfare we have been
able, in close proximity to the center of the enemy's power, to maintain
the seat of our chosen Government free from the pollution of his
presence; while the memories of the heroic dead who have freely given
their lives to its defense must ever remain enshrined in our hearts;
while the preservation of the capital, which is usually regarded as the
evidency to mankind of separate national existence, was an object very
dear to us, it is also true, and should not be forgotten, that the loss
which we have suffered is not without compensation. For many months the
largest and finest army of the Confederacy, under the command of a
leader whose presence inspires equal confidence in the troops and the
people, has been greatly trammeled by the necessity of keeping constant
watch over the approaches to the capital, and has thus been forced to
forego more than one opportunity for promising enterprise. The hopes
and confidence of the enemy have been constantly excited by the belief
that their possession of Richmond would be the signal for our submission
to their rule, and relieve them from the burden of war, as their
failing resources admonish them it must be abandoned if not speedily
brought to a successful close. It is for us, my countrymen, to show by
our bearing under reverses how wretched has been the self-deception of
those who have believed us less able to endure misfortune with fortitude
than to encounter danger with courage. We have now entered upon a new
phase of a struggle the memory of which is to endure for all ages and to
shed an increasing luster upon our country.

Relieved from the necessity of guarding cities and particular
points, important but not vital to our defense, with an army free to
move from point to point and strike in detail the detachments and
garrisons of the enemy, operating on the interior of our own country,
where supplies are more accessible, and where the foe will be far
removed from his own base and cut off from all succor in case of
reverse, nothing is now needed to render our triumph certain but the
exhibition of our own unquenchable resolve. Let us but will it, and we
are free; and who, in the light of the past, dare doubt your purpose in
the future?

Animated by the confidence in your spirit and fortitude, which
never yet has failed me, I announce to you, fellow-countrymen, that it
is my purpose to maintain your cause with my whole heart and soul; that I
will never consent to abandon to the enemy one foot of the soil of any
one of the States of the Confederacy; that Virginia, noble State, whose
ancient renown has been eclipsed by her still more glorious recent
history, whose bosom has been bared to receive the main shock of this
war, whose sons and daughters have exhibited heroism so sublime as to
render her illustrious in all times to come - that Virginia, with the
help of her people, and by the blessing of Providence, shall be held and
defended, and no peace ever be made with the infamous invaders of her
homes by the sacrifice of any of her rights or territory. If by stress
of numbers we should ever be compelled to a temporary withdrawal from
her limits, or those of any other border State, again and again will we
return, until the baffled and exhausted enemy shall abandon in despair
his endless and impossible task of making slaves of a people resolved to
be free.

Let us not, then, despond, my countrymen; but, relying on the
never-failing mercies and protecting care of our God, let us meet the
foe with fresh defiance, with unconquered and unconquerable hearts.

Jeff'n Davis.

Transcribed from Messages and Papers of the Confederacy, compiled by James D. Richardson (2 vols., 1904), Volume 1, pp. 568-70.